PRESS: CEO says Shell interested in stakes in Gazprom’s assets

MOSCOW, Jul 11 (PRIME) -- Royal Dutch Shell is interested in acquiring stakes in production assets of Russian gas giant Gazprom, CEO Ben van Beurden said in an interview to Vedomosti business daily published Monday.

“I think yes, we would be interested in it,” he said.

He said that Shell does not want to buy stakes in existing production projects. “Our approach to investments in Russia is different. Everything that we have created until now in Russia is new projects. Salym Petroleum (a joint venture with Gazprom Neft) is a new company, Sakhalin-2 is a new company,” Vedomosti cited him as saying.

“Many companies just enter projects that are already working and receive profits, but we have another strategy. We believe that we may contribute more to a project that was created from scratch. I think that the strategy of building new competitive projects is a winning strategy.”

Sakhalin-2 is Russia’s first and only LNG plant. Gazprom owns 50% plus one share in the project’s operator Sakhalin Energy, Shell holds a 27.5% stake minus one share, Mitsui & Co. Ltd owns 12.5% and Mitsubishi Corporation has a 10% interest.

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